Buntingford gradually dropped his cigarette to listen.

“Very curious—­very interesting,” he said ironically, as French paused, “and has lost nothing in the telling.”

“Ah, but wait till you hear the end!” cried Helena.  “Now, it’s my turn.”

And she completed the tale, holding up the bag at the close of it, so that the tarnished gold of its embroidery caught the light.

Buntingford took it from her, and turned it over.  Then he opened it, drew out the handkerchief, and looked at the initials, “‘F.  M.’” He shook his head.  “Conveys nothing.  But you’re quite right.  That bag has nothing to do with a village woman—­unless she picked it up.”

“But the face I saw had nothing to do with a village woman, either,” said French, with conviction.  “It was subtle—­melancholy—­intense—­more than that!—­fierce, fiercely miserable.  I guess that the woman possessing it would be a torment to her belongings if they happened not to suit her.  And, my hat!—­if you made her jealous!”

“Was she handsome?” asked Lodge.

Geoffrey shrugged his shoulders.

“Must have been—­probably—­when she was ten years younger.”

“And she possessed this bag?” mused Buntingford—­“which she or some one bought at Florence—­for I’ve discovered the address of a shop in it—­Fratelli Cortis, Via Tornabuoni, Firenze.  You didn’t find that out, Helena.”

He passed the bag to her, pointing out a little printed silk label which had been sewn into the neck of it.  Then Vivian Lodge asked for it and turned it over.

“Lovely work—­and beautiful materials.  Ah!—­do you see what it is?”—­he held it up—­“the Arms of Florence, embroidered in gold and silver thread.  H’m.  I suppose, Buntingford, you get some Whitsuntide visitors in the village?”

“Oh, yes, a few.  There’s a little pub with one or two decent rooms, and several cottagers take lodgers.  The lady, whoever she was, was scarcely a person of delicacy.”

“She was in that place for an object,” said Geoffrey, interrupting him with some decision.  “Of that I feel certain.  If she had just lost her way, and was trespassing—­she must have known, I think, that she was trespassing—­why didn’t she answer my call and let me put her over the lake?  Of course I should never have seen her at all, but for that accident of the searchlight.”

“The question is,” said Buntingford, “how long did she stay there?  She was not under the yews when you saw her?”

“No—­just outside.”

“Well, then, supposing, to get out of the way of the searchlight, she found her way in and discovered my seat—­how long do you guess she was there?—­and when the bag dropped?”

“Any time between then—­and midnight—­when Helena found it,” said French.  “She may have gone very soon after I saw her, leaving the bag on the seat; or, if she stayed, on my supposition that she was there for the purpose of spying, then she probably vanished when she heard our boat drawn up, and knew that Helena and I were getting out.”